The influence of parental expectations on college students’ esteem

Mom and Dad are going to flip out over my 3.3 GPA and failure to land a top internship. Such anxieties, common among college students, can harm self-esteem and make it more difficult to adjust to school. But a new University of Central Florida study has found that students’ anxieties often are based on exaggerated perceptions of what their parents expect.

The problem, UCF psychologist Kimberly Renk says, is that many parents and students hold different perceptions of what the parents’ expectations are. Students often are trying to meet goals far tougher than the ideals their parents have in mind